Digital Photography
Spring 09


ART 82 - DIGITAL PHOTOGRAPHY - 4205 4:00pm-7:00pm - 01/13-05/12

Class Schedule: 
Tuesdays 4:00pm-7:00pm

Location:
Barnett 1261

Office Hours:
Monday / Wednesday 11:00 - 12:00 by appointment.

Instructor:  John Sappington - john@basearts.com

ANALY HALL - ART COMPUTER LAB HOURS

Tuesday / Thursday - 1:30-4:30

Analy Hall - Shooting Studio by Appointment

Mon/Wed - 12-4 | 4:30 - 7

 

Overview
Schedule
Resources

REPEAT Students <--CLICK HERE

Syllabus Overview Expectations, Requirements, Objectives, Best Practices.

Assignment:

• Bring Camera to second class meeting with cables (usb/firewire), or card reader.
• Locate and begin reading Camera Manual - Cover to Cover.
• Set Camera to highest resolution / lowest compression.
• TURN OFF THE FLASH! Until further notice.
  
  
• Make 5-10 Digital Camera images between the first and the second class meeting
  - Bring these to share on the 2nd class meeting. - (1)
  
  
• Begin JOURNAL of questionable functions, settings, usage, portfolio ideas, reading notes etc...
  
• Email john@basearts.com with your current email address
  - include SRJC Digital Photo and your section number in the subject line.

Lomographic Society
http://www.lomographics.com

Lecture:

Digital Technology

Camera / Scanner
Scanning Procedures - Flat Art

Transferring images from camera/media to system.

Begin fundamentals of camera technology/exposure.

Lab:

Establish Home Directories
Work with camera connection / file transfer

Assignment:

Shooting in Low Light without a flash. - (7)

Feel free to experiment, try to find the lowest level of light possible to render a readable image.

Depending on what you may or may not know regarding ISO, experiment with this setting in your camera as well.


Objects for Scanning - 3 Dimensional Objects as well as prints or flat art that you may want to digitize. - (2)

Review Historical Photograms/Montage works:

Photograms and Montage Samples
Niko Robinson - Student Scanner work
more scanner work - various

Artists:

Lazlo Moholy-Nagy
Man Ray
Bruce Conner
David Hockney

Olivia Parker
http://oliviaparker.com/newindex.php

Reading:

Camera Manuals continued - journal with questions/notes from the manual.

Digital Camera Review - Technical Glossary
http://www.dpreview.com/learn/?/Glossary/
http://www.dpreview.com/learn/?/Glossary/Camera_System/


Local Galleries and Suppliers

Lecture:

Camera Operation

Photoshop Introduction

• File Browser - Bridge
• File Types, Format

Lab

First File Transfers

Assignment:

Bracketing Exposures

3 Subjects - 3-5 exposures for each with alternate exposure. - (3)

1st exposure according to meter reading.
2nd + .5 half step greater aperture/shutter selection or more exposure (over)
3rd + 1 whole step (full stop) greater aperture/shutter selection (over)
4th .5 half step smaller aperture/shutter selection or less exposure (under)
5th - 1 whole step smaller aperture/shutter selection or less exposure (under)

------------------------

Experiment with White Balance Bracketing.

Reading:

Moholy-Nagy - From Pigment to Light - 1936

Artists:

Eadweard Muybridge
Paul Strand
Eugene Atget

Sites:

Lecture

Lecture:


Camera:

Best Practices

Shot Card Rev.2 for field experiments
Shot Card for field experiments

Photoshop:

PS Best Practice #1 - Duplicate the pixel based background layer as first step on opening a .jpeg.

• Layers Palette Introduction
• Adjustment Layers
• Levels Adjustment Layers
  
  
  Photoshop User Guide - 42.6Mb PDF
  

Lab:

Assignment:

- Equivalents: Motion / Blur

3-5 Images which illustrate the side effects of shutter speed / time value selections. - (5)

Shutter / Time Values:
Fig 1

Reading:

Ansel Adams - .pdf - 344KB - 3 pages
Edward Weston - .pdf - 360KB - 3 pages

(first left hand spread of each essay is last page of that essay)

Henri Cartier-Bresson - 234KB

Artists:

Henri Cartier-Bresson
http://www.magnumphotos.com/Archive/C.aspx?VP=XSpecific_MAG.PhotographerDetail_VPage&l1=0&pid=2K7O3R14T1LX&nm=Henri%20Cartier%20%2D%20Bresson

John Divola
http://www.divola.com/

Uta Barth
http://www.sieshoeke.com/artists/uta-barth

Hiroshi Sugimoto
http://www.sugimotohiroshi.com/portfolio.html

Lecture:

• Adjustment Layers
• Levels Adjustment Layers
• Histogram
  
• Size / Resize / Resolution

PS Best Practice #1 - Duplicate the pixel based background layer as first step on opening a .jpeg.

PS Best Practice #2 - All adjustments to adjustment layers - no pixel damage.

Assignment:

1st Critique 03.03.09- 10-15 images of your own work - looking toward portfolio subjects. If you haven't made any decisions it could be just images you have made since the beginning of the semester that you believe were good.

---

Contact Sheets of Brackets/Equivalents

Create a minimum of 3 contact sheets documenting bracketing exposure experiments. - (6)

---
Review :

Bracketing
Equivalents (Shutter and Aperture side effects)
Wrap up current technical experiements

Readings:


Artists:

Lauren Greenfield
http://www.creativephotography.org/education/educatorsGuides/girlculturefacultyguide/

Henry Wessel
http://www.renabranstengallery.com/wessel.html

Stephen Shore
http://www.masters-of-fine-art-photography.com/02/artphotogallery/photographers/stephen_shore_13.html

Todd Hido
Larry Sultan


Sites:

Lecture:

• Curves - Adjustment Layers
• Channel Mixer- Adjustment Layers
  
• Size/Resize/Resolution
  
• Shadows and Hightlights
• Working with layers as masks

Assignment:

Artists:

John Baldessari
Sophie Calle
Nick Waplington

---

Lecture:

• Roxio Toast - CD and DVD Burning

Photoshop:

• Working with and around Selections
  
• Photo Filters- Adjustment Layers
  
• Sharpening
  Unsharp Mask
  
• History Brush
• Compositing
• Extract
• Selections - Paths (Pen)
• Blending Options

Lab:


Critiques - 5 pnts.

5 Images - should represent beginnings of portfolio subjects either content or technique.

Assignment:

Subject explorations / Framing exercise. - (8)

Shoot a minimum of 20 images of a single subject from every angle and a variety of compositional arrangements.

explore position/ balance/ background/ etc...

03.24.09

Mid-Term Interviews - 5 pnts

The midterm interview is mandatory and = to a shooting assignment.

Prepare a selection of ideas for you your final portfolio. Write up a brief description of each and submit during the interview. Reference specific images within your home directory if you have images related to the subjects chosen for the final portfolio.

You are only required to show up for the time of your interview.

If you haven't signed up email me for a time.

Evaluation Form <--click here
(Please Complete and Submit from your home system)

Photoshop: Printing


Process to Print Handout

Processing a Digital Image.pdf (for print)

----

Printing Demonstration - Epson R1800 / 1280

- Sharpening
- LAB Color Mode/Luminance Sharpening


Printer :

• Resolution (review)
  
• File Preparation
• Color Management
• Color Modes
  

Papers
Surface/Finish
Texture
Color
Weight

• Random Photoshop tools
  - ruler
  - skew/perspective Tranformations for barrel or pincushion distortion (not parallax) see ref:
  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image_distortion
  

• Text - Typography
  Text tools
  Vector graphics
  

Assignment:

Printing
5 prints - 5 pnts. - 8x10 minimum - (9)

Lab:

Printing continues through to the end...

Additional Printing Resources:

http://www.basearts.com/curriculum/PDF/ - see contents for various PDFs

Epson R1800 Printing Guide

Artists:

Jeff Wall
Bernd and Hilla Becher
Gregory Crewdson
Richard Barnes

Digital Art Supplies (San Diego based, print supply )
http://www.digitalartsupplies.com

PS Print (LA based commercial printer)
http://www.psprint.com/
Preparing files for print - Pagemaker, Illustrator
http://www.psprint.com/helpcenter/preparingyourfiles/digitalcheck_pm.asp


---------------local printers santa rosa

Northbay Photo Supply (Santa Rosa, based photo supply)
http://www.photosupply.com
location map
http://www.photosupply.com/aboutusindex.htm

Skylark Images
http://www.skylarkimages.com/

The Lab
http://www.thelabsantarosa.com

Lenny Eiger
http://www.eigerphoto.com/index_ep.php

Lecture:

• Lens - Handout
  
  Angle of View:
  Fig 1
  
  
• Lighting
  
  - Utilizing Ambient Light
  - Flash
  
  
• Composition
  
  -tone
  -balance
  -line
  -framing

Lab

Critique - Current progress on portfolios - (5 pnts)
------------

Assignment:

3-5 images of light - (10)

- Pre-Visualization
- sensitivity toward the lighting conditions(less focus on subject)

Artists:

Diane Arbus
Jeff Wall
Richard Barnes
Daido Moriyama
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moriyama_Daido

Harold Edgerton
Richard Avedon
Irving Penn

Reading:

Susan Sontag - Plato's Cave

-----

http://www.cambridgeincolour.com/tutorials.htm

http://www.cambridgeincolour.com/tutorials/camera-lenses.htm

http://www.cambridgeincolour.com/tutorials/hyperfocal-distance.htm

Rule of Thirds
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rule_of_thirds
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Rule_of_thirds_1845_George_Field_Chromatics.png

Golden Mean
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_ratio

Lecture:

Camera RAW

Reading :

Camera Raw:

dcraw is an open source computer program which is able to read numerous raw image formats, typically produced by high-end digital cameras. dcraw converts these images into the standard PPM and TIFF image formats. This conversion is sometimes referred to as developing a raw image (by analogy with the process of film development) since it renders raw image sensor data (a "digital negative") into a viewable form.

Lecture

Automation / Scripting

Internet Presence / Websites

• Batch and Automation
• Image Ready
• Optimization

Text - Typography

• Text tools
• Vector graphics
  
  

Lab

Critique - 5-10 Progress toward final subjects

Review images of light.

Printing continues ...

Photo Sharing

http://www.webshots.com
http://www.dpchallenge.com
http://www.flickr.com/
http://www.slide.com
http://www.kodakgallery.com/
http://www.snapfish.com/
http://www.shutterbook.com/home/
http://www.deviantart.com/
http://www.zoto.com/
http://www.smugmug.com
http://www.apple.com/ilife/iphoto/

Commercial Photographers - Online presence (sampling)

http://www.svenwiederholt.com/
http://www.peterkoval.com/
http://www.nadavkander.com
http://www.jockmcdonald.com/
http://www.milesaldridge.com/
http://www.marcleclef.com/


Artists :

Lynn Hershman Leeson
http://www.lynnhershman.com

George LeGrady
http://www.georgelegrady.com

John Maeda

http://www.maedastudio.com/
http://dbn.media.mit.edu/
http://www.maedastudio.com/indexold.html
http://acg.media.mit.edu/people/maeda/

Ted Nelson

http://www.iath.virginia.edu/elab/hfl0155.html
http://xanadu.com/
http://ted.hyperland.com/

Lev Manovich

http://www.manovich.net/bio_00.htm
http://www.manovich.net/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lev_Manovich

Victoria Vesna

http://www.bodiesinc.ucla.edu/

Timothy Druckrey

http://users.rcn.com/druckrey/
http://users.rcn.com/druckrey/texts.html

Wed. 04.29.09 - 9 a.m.

Shooting Opportunity:

Sonoma Horticultural Nursery
3970 Azalea Avenue Sebastopol, CA 95472

>Directions here<


Please print and complete the waiver below and return.

http://www.santarosa.edu/for_students/student_affairs/pdf/SRJC_Field_Trip_Activity_Liability_Waiver.pdf

Reading:

November 16, 2008
What Is Art For?
By DANIEL B. SMITH
Lewis Hyde and the Copy Left Movement

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/16/magazine/16hyde-t.html

-----------------

CAA

Intellectual Property and the Arts

This section provides links to CAA’s activities on intellectual-property matters as well as to useful websites and resources of other organizations.

CAA’s members are both copyright owners and users of copyrighted material. Artists and authors create new works, and many also quote from or repurpose material created by others. CAA encourages all members to become familiar with intellectual-property law as it affects you.

http://www.collegeart.org/ip/#CopyrightBasics

Electronic Frontier Foundation
http://www.eff.org

Intellectual Property Online: Patent, Trademark, Copyright
http://www.eff.org/IP/

U.S. Copyright Office
http://www.copyright.gov

Digimarc
www.digimarc.com
http://www.digimarc.com/mypicturemarc/

The Free Expression Policy Project
http://www.fepproject.org/fepp/fairuseintro.html

Artists:

Zhang Huan

Additional Readings:

Orphan Works

An orphan work is a copyrighted work where it is difficult or impossible to contact the copyright holder. This situation can arise for many reasons. The author could have never been publicly known because the work was published anonymously or the work may have never been traditionally published at all. The identity of the author could have been once known but the information lost over time. Even if the author is known, it may not be possible to determine who inherited the copyright and presently owns it. Nearly any work where a reasonable effort to locate the current copyright owner fails can be considered orphaned. However the designation is often used loosely and in some jurisdictions there is no legal definition at all.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orphan_works
http://www.copyright.gov/orphan/
-----------------

Lecture:

Text - Typography

• Text tools
• Vector graphics
  
  

Artists:

John Baldessari
Duane Michaels